The major consideration of this novel is life and death with its various plotlines orbiting a nucleus of confusion and sorrow. The novel offers a portrait of life that demands a speculate philosophy to survive; a Dreamer might have a leg up in this regard. These characters are forced to endure life's daily challenges while hoping to free themselves from frustrating disenfranchisement. The deaths of the unborn child and Cindy make the tone frustrated with contemplations on meanlinglessness, but the presence of new life makes this community wonder whether life is more than meets the eye.
For instance, when Neni's second child is born, the mother names her "Amatimba," which means, "She has returned," as if to say that the spirit of the second child is the spirit of the first child who died. This belief is a specific kind of resurrection or reincarnation belief that points the reader thematically toward mystical religion and God. The gift of life is celebrated by Neni, but the reader must also consider if perhaps her approach is betraying an emotional glitch in her perception.
Are those children the same? To say they are is mystical, because what would be the principles by which two human beings might share the same spirit? This ancestral, religious point of view is often held in direct contrast to human life and human vices. There is exploitation, betrayal, drug overdose, imprisonment—all the woes of man. On the one side, the argument from Neni's grief is that she desperately needs her daughter to live, but the adult characters often wander in ennui wondering why life is worth living.
